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Saskatchewan Joins with Canada's New Government to Announce Patient Wait Times Guarantee

REGINA, March 29 /CNW Telbec/ - The Honourable Tony Clement, Federal
Minister of Health, and the Honourable Len Taylor, Saskatchewan Health
Minister today announced that Saskatchewan has agreed to establish a Patient
Wait Times Guarantee in coronary artery bypass graft surgery by 2010, to be
supported by $24.8 million in federal Budget 2007 funding. Saskatchewan will
also be eligible to benefit from the $400 million in new funding for Canada
Health Infoway, and the $30 million for pilot projects as announced in Budget
2007.
"Saskatchewan will join the growing list of provinces and territories
that are working with Canada's New Government to establish Patient Wait Time
Guarantees," said Minister Clement. "For the first time, Saskatchewan's
residents will be guaranteed timely health care access in the area of coronary
artery bypass graft surgery. We congratulate Saskatchewan for committing to
this historic step forward in patient care."
The Government of Saskatchewan is establishing a wait times guarantee for
coronary artery bypass graft surgery across Saskatchewan's regional health
authorities within the publicly funded health care system. Current
pan-Canadian benchmarks for this procedure will be used, ranging from 2 weeks
to 26 weeks, depending on the identified level of urgency for each patient.
Emergency procedures will continue to be handled on a priority basis.
"This assistance from the federal government will be invested to further
our goal of providing residents with needed health services in a timely
fashion," said Minister Taylor. "The Saskatchewan government has made real
progress in improving access to diagnostic imaging procedures, surgeries and
other services."
"In our recent discussions, the federal government has acknowledged the
innovation and progress demonstrated in our province, particularly in the
outstanding work of the Saskatchewan Surgical Care Network," Minister Taylor
said. "Saskatchewan, along with other provinces and territories, looks forward
to meaningful discussions with the federal health minister this coming spring
that will focus on how we can be partners in continuing this progress."
Cardiac bypass surgery, or coronary artery bypass graft (CABG), is one of
five priority procedures identified in the 2004 10-Year Plan to Strengthen
Health Care signed by provinces, territories and the federal government.
Saskatchewan Health will work closely with Regional Health Authorities,
cardiac specialists and other health system partners to establish and
implement a reasonable and responsible recourse for those who do not receive
their cardiac bypass surgery within the guaranteed time frame.
Saskatchewan will also undertake a pilot project in the area of recourse
for cardiac patients. This pilot project will use a provincial pathway for
cardiac services with referral guidelines, service protocols and consideration
of specialized transportation requirements.
This announcement marks another step forward by Canada's New Government
as it continues to work towards ensuring that all Canadians receive essential
medical treatment within clinically acceptable wait times.
Canada's New Government is providing up to $612 million in a Patient Wait
Times Guarantee Trust, $400 million for health information technology through
Infoway, an organization which is making significant progress in working with
provinces and territories to implement electronic health records. In addition
to these investments, $30 million over three years will go to provinces and
territories for pilot projects related to establishing guarantees.
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INFORMATION March 2007
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Canada Health Infoway
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What is Infoway?
Canada Health Infoway is an independent, not-for-profit corporation
established in 2001. Infoway's goal is to put in place the basic elements of a
Canada-wide system of interoperable electronic health records for 50% of
Canadians by the end of 2009. To achieve this goal, Infoway works as a
strategic investor to accelerate the development of health information and
communications technologies, including electronic health records, telehealth
and public health surveillance systems on a pan-Canadian basis. The Members of
Infoway are the 14 Federal/Provincial/Territorial Deputy Ministers of Health.
How does this work relate to the federal government's priorities?
The Government is committed to delivering the health care Canadians need,
when they need it.
A patient wait times guarantee has been identified by Canadians as one of
the most important government priorities. Investment in electronic health
records is a key building block in establishing a health care system that
provides improved access, quality and productivity, resulting in the reduction
of wait times.
The anticipated benefits of an interoperable, pan-Canadian electronic
health record system include:
- Canadians not having to repeat their health history to every provider
along their journey through the health care system;
- increased patient safety, as the provision of faster, better
information will speed diagnosis and treatment and help prevent medical
errors;
- public health professionals better equipped to respond to emerging
health crisis, having improved disease tracking and surveillance tools;
- reduced health care system costs resulting from fewer duplicated
laboratory and clinical tests.
How much funding does Infoway receive from the federal government?
In the 2000 and 2003 Health Accords, First Ministers agreed to place a
priority on funding the development of electronic health records and
telehealth. The federal government invested $1.1 billion in Infoway in
response to those agreements and , in 2004, an additional $100 million in
support of public health surveillance. In Budget 2007, the government
announced an additional $400 million to Infoway to advance patient wait times
guarantees through the development of health information systems and
electronic health records.
Infoway works collaboratively with health ministries, private sector
information technology and health care partners, and end users of electronic
health record solutions, including physicians, nurses and pharmacists. The
corporation adds value through joint planning with provinces and territories,
development and promotion of common architecture and standards, investment in
shared services, sharing of knowledge, negotiation of national pricing with
vendors and coordination of common procurement.
Adherence to the national architecture and standards for electronic health
records, collaboratively developed by Infoway and its partners, allows
jurisdictions to develop systems that meet their own priorities, with an
assurance that all shared systems and components will be compatible.
Costs are shared:
- Infoway covers up to 100% of territorial and 75% of provincial project
development and implementation costs (the provincial share is 25%)
- provinces and territories are responsible for 100% of ongoing operating
and maintenance costs
What are the results to date?
With over 160 electronic health records projects in the planning or
implementation stages, solid progress is being made in a variety of areas that
contribute to the needed reductions in patient wait times. To date, Infoway
and its partners have developed infrastructure elements, such as standards, an
electronic health records architecture, a privacy and security framework and
registries to uniquely identify patients and providers.
There have been some early successes in diagnostic imaging, laboratory and
drug information systems. Many of the jurisdictions are currently moving from
a planning mode into wide scale development and implementation, and
significantly more visible accomplishments are expected in the near future. A
recent diagnostic imaging study showed that 80% of referring physicians
indicate wait times to review an exam were reduced and 86% of radiologists say
turn-around time has improved.
Of the more than 160 projects mentioned above, here are a few
recently-announced electronic health record initiatives, in which Infoway has
had varying levels of involvement and investment:
- Quebec's $547 million plan to create a province-wide electronic health
record by 2011;
- British Columbia's investment of $150 million to develop a province-
wide electronic health record by 2009;
- Alberta's addition of $116 million to existing investments aimed at
delivering electronic health records for all Albertans by 2008;
- Prince Edward Island has launched a $13 million project to provide an
electronic health record for doctors' offices, hospitals and pharmacies
by 2007.
For more information on Infoway, please go to: www.infoway-inforoute.ca
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INFORMATION March 2007
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Patient Wait Times Guarantees
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Patient Wait Times Guarantees (PWTGs) are important tools to help provide
certainty for patients, build public confidence in the public health system
and enhance system accountability. As international experience has shown,
PWTGs can be designed to meet particular needs as part of a multi-pronged
access strategy.
In order to fulfill the above intended objectives, PWTGs should include
the following core elements:
- a defined timeframe to establish when medically necessary health care
services should be delivered; and,
- access to alternative options of care that are automatically offered to
patients if the system fails to deliver treatment within the defined
time frame.
Timeframe
A defined timeframe would ideally be informed by scientific evidence,
clinical consensus as well as other jurisdictional considerations (i.e.,
capacity). Evidence-based benchmarks would therefore continue to function as
the guide posts for the timely provision of care with targets indicating how
jurisdictions plan to achieve the benchmarks. The defined timeframe would
build on the common benchmarks and provincial/territorial wait times targets
and complement the overall strategies to improve timely access to required
health services (i.e., appropriate referrals/service use, clinical thresholds
for getting on a wait list, centralized tracking).
However, a defined timeframe without the offer of access to alternative
care options does not represent a PWTG, as it does not help to provide
certainty for patients.
Access to Alternative Care Options
Access to alternative care options (recourse) would give patients the
certainty that should their wait time exceed the defined timeframe, the system
would automatically respond by offering options for obtaining timely care
(e.g., ranging from access to another provider within the same institution,
through to service outside the jurisdiction). Patients would not need to
initiate a process for recourse on their own. Whether or not the patient
accepts such alternative care options, however, is ultimately their choice.
Existing alongside system-initiated access to alternate care options,
patients would continue to have access to processes that they initiate
themselves (i.e., ombudsperson, administrative tribunals), although these can
be burdensome on patients and involve a more litigious approach.
Current system improvements to monitor and inform patients as they wait
for care (centralized tracking/ booking systems, patient navigators) serve to
minimize the ultimate need for alternate care options and assist patients as
they move through their care journey.
This understanding of PWTGs offers patients increased certainty of timely
care while providing provincial and territorial governments considerable
flexibility in determining the definition of the timeframe and the range of
options for alternative care to be offered. There is also significant
flexibility in the services covered and timelines for implementation,
recognizing the differing circumstances, starting points and priorities of
provinces and territories.